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The Elephants in the Room

A noted and highly respected physicist was recently interviewed on his thoughts concerning the future of mankind. My goodness, what an acid trip. And I repeat, he is highly respected. It was like walking into the mind of a stoned-out, head-in-the-clouds, overly self-satisfied, pie-in-the-sky, goo-gah, ‘aren’t we the greatest’, lost-in-space reality-challenged science fiction writer who’d obviously o-d’d on far too many episodes of ‘Star Trek’. I mean he had us communicating with aliens by the end of the century and that a typical conversation (with said aliens) might take three hundred years (one-way) because of the light years separating us (and them). Which means it would take 600 years to actually get a reply back.

He went on to expound – as though he knew what he was talking about – that alien intelligence is measured in terms of ‘type 1, type 2 and type 3’ quotients (humans are ‘type 0’, at the bottom end of the scale and a ‘type 1’ alien conversing with one of us would be equivalent to a human being trying to talk to a squirrel??? A squirrel…these were his exact words). Oh, did I mention he is highly respected. Colonizing Mars was a ‘no-brainer’… we’ll just install huge mirrors in the Martian skies and melt the polar ice caps and re-hydrate the planet for agriculture.

Back here on Earth things get even more bizarre. We will incorporate the human brain (mind) into a robot and conquer aging and death by infusing human cells with special enzymes that don’t know how to die. And this all in the next eighty years or so. And on and on he went. I recall in the lengthy interview that Mr Gonzo-physicist mentioned only once – and in ten words or less – that there might be ‘a few problems’ on Earth that could negatively impact his grand and ultra-futuristic predictions. Hmm… a few problems… on Earth.

I’m trying to remember… did I mention he’s highly respected?

I mean really, what was this guy smoking??? Mr ‘science-will-save-the-world’ needs to wake up and realize that ‘might be a few problems’ could easily qualify as the most asinine understatement of the century, perhaps even the millennium. The reason this gushing, over-caffeinated ‘space cadet’ is so popular and highly respected is he represents – and is the mouth-piece for – a major and ever-growing movement of like minded techno-geeks who’ve disappeared so far down the ‘rabbit hole’ (or up the ‘butt-hole’) of their own unbridled imaginations, into a fantasy world that is underpinned by ignorance, arrogance and denial of what’s happening in the ‘real world’. Yes, the ‘real world’, down here on Earth where, for example, we are currently in the midst of a major and ever-accelerating extinction event… that ‘real world’.

Elephants in the room.

The few minor problems that ‘super-techno-space-man’ briefly alluded to are, in reality, more like ten restless and angry African elephants locked in a school gymnasium…and they’re getting angrier and more upset by the minute. And to add to the drama, two high school basketball teams – plus all their fans – are not only attempting to play a game of basketball but are, at the same time, trying their hardest to ignore and deny that the ten angry, marauding pachyderms even exist. The sad part is that this is not an over-exaggeration.

(Author’s note: The following is a condensed list of ten of the more prominent ‘elephants in the room’ that may, just may interfere with the unfolding of ‘Cap’n Kirk’s’ very grand, very elitist and very illusionary utopia. And unless one has been living with their head in the sand for the past twenty or thirty years the following list of ‘elephants’ should be, for the most part, self-explanatory and not require any further elaboration).